The Devil's in the Details
Devil Summoner 2 does action RPGs and monster collection oh so right.
Published: June 28, 2009
All this new combat is wrapped around the same moody, jazz-backed aural soundtrack as the first game. Though he's now partnered up with Narumi, his impeccably-dressed friend from the first game (who, along with spiritual-adviser-in-cat-form Gouto make up the main staff of the detective agency), Raido isn't Sherlock Holmes. When a striking woman drops in with a classic noir case of a mysterious man that she needs tracked down. Things quickly spiral outward as the girl's identity is question and Raido is attacked by mysterious... um... bugs. It's a little complex, but suffice it to say, the storyline offers just enough teases to keep it interesting, which is going because chasing down leads can in incredibly tough at times.
It's not that there's a lot of difficult combat (though that can crop up), but more that the game often stays painfully vague on where you're supposed to go. The case files you have only reference basic details or locations, and some of those locales have to be visited in a particular order to progress the storyline. You're essentially asked to figure out the order in which the developers want you to follow vague breadcrumbs without actually knowing where those breadcrumbs are.
It's unfortunate because the rest of the game so perfectly nails the period, characters and increasingly whacked out storyline. Devil Summoner 2 isn't a short game by any stretch, but expect more than a few cheap deaths (hey it is a Shin Megami Tensei game) and a lot of aimless running around until some FAQs are kicked up online.
You can also expect everything to run beautifully. The game runs at a butter smoove framerate all the time, and it's nice to see late-life PS2 games finally bumping up against that 60fps barrier. The animations are slick, the effects are particle-rich and the pre-rendered backgrounds are gorgeous -- just as they were in the first game. A fixed camera can lead to annoying shifts in direction if not handled right, but these are usually a fine trade-off for visuals that would be otherwise impossible on the hardware. Plus, it's nice to see this technique still being used; there's a lot of atmosphere and punch that can come from pre-rendering backgrounds, naysayers be damned.
The audio, too, is superlative. The music is a peppy kind of distinctly Japanese kind of jazz (think more slicky produced and neatly arranged than similar-era American stuff, but not nearly as cringe-worthy as... ugh... "smooth jazz" -- it's still more Coltrane or Parker than Kenny G or... um... any other of those pap-crafters), and though there's not nearly enough voice work (though it might be tough to strike a period-right tone with decidedly modern localization in a lot of places), the overall tone of the game doesn't let any one aural bit falter too much.
Despite any frustration the game might offer, and even with portions of it being copied and pasted from the previous game into this one, the world and story that Atlus has made here is so damned interesting that it never really seems to matter. These are some great characters, presented in a unique style and setting that most games -- even JRPGs -- can't really match. I keep thinking I've played the last big PS2 RPG, and Atlus keeps going, "ah ah, we've got oneeeeee more." Still with the landscape of seriously awesome PS2 titles looking more and more barren, this really might be the last great PS2 RPG. Enjoy it while it's available, because with the crazy plushy and clear box, this collector's edition is likely to disappear fast.
